


keep on damning the devil

by carrythesky



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Angst, Denial of Feelings, Dreams and Nightmares, F/M, Frank tries not to think about Karen and it goes about as well as you'd expect, Heavy Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-29
Updated: 2016-12-29
Packaged: 2018-09-13 06:53:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9111403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carrythesky/pseuds/carrythesky
Summary: She shows up outside his door a few days later. He’s never given much credence to things like fate or destiny, but he has to laugh because it feels a little prophetic, like the universe is once again pushing back the expiration date on this thing that exists between the two of them.





	

It’s like this:

 

He thinks about her more than he should. Small things, at first - the tilt of her smile, the way she seems to talk more with her eyes than her mouth - and soon he’s stumbling down the rabbit’s hole, lost in the details, pieces of Karen Page that have somehow become rooted in his mind. He’s spent barely a handful of moments in her presence, and that’s how he knows he’s fucked, when he catches himself _replaying_ them in his head. All he has to do is close his eyes and bam - she’s pressing the photo of his family into his hands, telling him he’s going to rot in his goddamn jail cell, leveling the .380 at him with steady hands and pure, unflinching resolve in her eyes -

 

 _Do you believe me now?_ he asks over and over and over, never expecting an answer.

 

_I believe you._

 

It - she - scares him shitless, so he reasons his way through it. Wrestles down the stirrings in his chest with some military-grade logic, tells himself she’s just a journalist, a source of information. Maybe even an ally in this twisted crusade of his, but nothing more. He doesn’t think about how normal he feels around her, how she’s probably the only person on earth he trusts as much as himself. He doesn’t think about it, because he still wakes up gasping, choking out their names as the memory of that day strangles him from the outside in. It’s moments like these when he thinks maybe it would’ve been easier if she’d just pulled the trigger that night in her apartment, plugged him right where he stood. He’s tired, so goddamn tired -

 

Maybe it would’ve been easier if she’d pulled the trigger and let him sleep.

 

\-----

 

It’s like this:

 

Most nights, his dreams are consistent. He watches them die, again and again - sometimes at the carousel, sometimes in the ruins of his house, screams swallowed up by smoke and flame - but always, _always,_ he’s helpless to save them. It’s...not good, he thinks, but at least it’s safe. _Consistent._ He knows exactly how his subconscious will torture him, knows how badly it’ll ache even before it happens. On a good night, he knows what’s waiting for him when he closes his eyes.

 

On a bad night -

 

On a bad night, he dreams they’re still alive.

 

\-----

 

He’s pretending to be asleep. Sunlight presses against his eyes, soft and warm, but he keeps them closed as her fingers trace lazy circles across his face, skim his cheekbones towards the soft spot of skin behind his ear. He twitches, jerks away slightly, and she hums knowingly.

 

“Knew you weren’t sleeping,” she murmurs, lips hovering above his.

 

He smirks and tilts his chin so that his mouth catches hers. She tastes like honey and peppermint, and that, absurdly, is how he knows he’s dreaming - fuckin’ morning breath was never this sweet.

 

“ _Shit_ ,” he sighs.

 

“You kiss our kids with that mouth, Castle?” she says, all soft and playful, and _christ_ , he’s missed this, the way her voice sounds when she’s ribbing him. He can feel her lips curve into a smile, and when she pulls back slightly he blinks his eyes open.

 

Maria is bent over him, arms propped on his chest and chin resting in the valley between her interlocked hands, and he thinks a sucker-punch to the solar plexus would hurt less than the way she looks right now, like a goddamn painting, sunlight dusting her skin and setting the blue in her eyes aglow -

 

\- and it’s muscle memory, the way he reaches out, pulls her towards him and crushes her body against his, buries his face in the juncture of her neck and shoulder. Breathes her in. His chest feels like it might implode beneath the weight of everything he’s feeling in this moment, and it’s too much, it’s too much for him, being so close to her again and knowing it’s still not close enough -

 

 _“Frank-_ ”

 

He jolts, and Maria’s gone. Around him, his house burns.

 

He’s standing in the kitchen, and Karen Page is at the sink, wrist-deep in soapy water as she scrubs the remnants of his family’s last meal away. “They weren’t washed,” she says, not turning. “The dishes. I lied.”

 

A portion of roof caves in, sending up a small cataclysm of smoke and flame at her feet, but she continues washing, unfazed, as if his past isn’t crumbling to ash around her. “Did you hear me?” she demands, whipping her face towards him. “Frank-”

 

\- and he’s suddenly out front, watching it flare against a backdrop of night sky. This isn’t how it happened, he thinks - he had set it ablaze and walked away without a backwards glance - but he watches anyway. Watches until there’s nothing left.

 

She’s standing beside him when it’s over.

 

“Wake up,” she says without looking at him.

 

He does.

 

\-----

 

She shows up outside his door a few days later. He’s never given much credence to things like fate or destiny, but he has to laugh because it feels a little prophetic, like the universe is once again pushing back the expiration date on this thing that exists between the two of them. Whatever it is, it was never meant to be long-term, but here she is, back in his world like he never slammed that door in her face.

 

“How the hell did you find me?” he asks as she steps through the entryway. It's a stupid question - he knows exactly how smart she is, equal-parts stubborn and determined in the pursuit of something she wants, and she knows this too. Her lips twitch into a smile.

 

This is very, very dangerous.

 

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” she says. It’s the first time he’s heard her voice in almost a year.

 

She moves past him and he closes the door behind her, fingers lingering against the handle as he hesitates a beat. Her gaze is heavy on his back, and he feels it all start to fall apart, the iron facade he’s been constructing since the day he’d decided to evict her from his head. He’s reminded, suddenly, of Maria - all it took was one glance from his old lady and he’d come apart at the seams, unravel completely - and his stomach twists. “Why are you here?” he grits out.

 

She exhales softly. “Frank.”

 

Something in her voice tugs at him, and he turns, pulse jack-hammering against his ribcage so hard he’s sure she can hear it. Her gaze is wildfire, a silent plea scorching the air that separates them, and this is _exactly_ why he’s stayed away - because as much as he tries to convince himself he’s cut her out, that she means nothing to him, the moment he’s near her again, the moment she looks at him -

 

That all goes to shit.

 

 _Danger danger danger_ , his heart pounds.

 

“I’m leaving New York,” she says.

 

\-----

 

And even now, after all this time has passed, it’s like this:

 

Her eyes, the question. His silence, the answer.

 

\-----

 

He’s not sure how long he stands there after she leaves. The thinly-wrapped package she’d handed him is like an anchor in his hands, and he stares vacantly at it for several moments before it occurs to him to open it. There’s a note tacked to the front - _Merry Christmas, you corny bastard,_ it reads - and a strangled laugh squeezes itself from his rusty lungs as he realizes what it is. “Damn it, Page,” he whispers, opening it slowly.

 

 _Wake up,_ she’d said in his dream. Maybe, he thinks, maybe he finally has.

 

He pulls back the last layer and stares down at the tape from Ben’s car.


End file.
